Showing at the is year’s Glasgow Film Festival as part of the South American strand is the movie How To Win Enemies. It is a delightful mix of comedy, mystery and deception. The film reinforces the burgeoning reputation that Argentinian cinema is cultivating with each passing year.
Lucas (Martin Slipak) is a young lawyer working alongside his brother at their law firm. He is the true brains and heart of the place. There appears to be no problem he cannot tackle. Things are in transition for the brothers. Max (Javier Drolas) is in the final preparations for his wedding and Lucas is in the process of finalising his deceased parents affairs. This involves selling the family home and sharing the inheritance between the brothers. Lucas has bought a new house and withdraws the sizeable deposit in cash in order to conclude the deal.
Later the same day he meets Barbara (Ines Palombo), a secretary, and there is an immediate connection. They arrange a date and end up back at Lucas’s house. They get comfortable and one thing results in another. The next morning Max awakes to find Barbera gone and the $50,000 house deposit missing. He soon appreciates that this was not an opportunistic robbery but he was specifically targeted. Rather than letting the matter go he decides to pursue the perpetrators using the skills he learned through years of reading crime fiction.
The film employs an episodic structure with the opening scenes representing the beginning of the finale. After this teaser we go back to the beginning. This suits the story really well and echoes the approach that some crime authors use in the telling of their stories. This allows the viewer to compartmentalise the information provided in order to help make the most sense from it.
It is a mixture of contemporary noir and family drama. The detective and crime angle and the subsequent investigation by Lucas come to the fore in the middle section of the film. He makes excellent use of the skills that he picked up from the pulp fiction he is obsessed by. There is a very good use of camera techniques as Lucas tries to track down Barbara. The camera rests behind his shoulder as he drives around town looking for clues to her motives. The noir elements are all present with the slighted leading man, the femme fatale and the off the wall sidekick who provides vital insights to the case. Even Lucas’s dog gets involved. With a name like Sherlock, he really had to.
The family drama comes from the Jewish upbringing of the two brothers. The tradition and customs of the family are the foundation of their relationship. This is broken down to a certain extent as Max is getting married and the family home is in the final stages of its sale. This creates an underlying tension which really affects Lucas. He has to go over everything that happened to him and just try to understand the truth. It doesn’t help that Max is fooling around with other women even before his wedding.
The film is well paced and it doesn’t waste any of its seventy eight minute run time. The writer / director, Gabriel Lichtmann, has a genuine talent for keeping the film moving and not allowing it to fall into a lull at any point. He also ensures that the story is teased out over the course of the film in order to keep the audience engaged. It is no easy thing to so and it should be applauded in this case.
Overall, a tight and entertaining drama. Recommended.
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